Dangerous Incrementalism of the Paris Agreement

Abstract

After a decade of negotiation, countries adopted a new, legally binding agreement on climate change. Excitement for a new era in the climate regime is palpable among pundits and policy makers alike. But such enthusiasm largely overlooks that most of the Paris Agreement’s provisions represent continuity with existing climate policy, not a break with the past. This forum argues that the Paris Agreement is a dangerous form of incrementalism in two ways. First, it repackages existing rules that have already proven inadequate to reduce emissions and improve resilience. Second, state and nonstate actors celebrate the Agreement as a solution, conferring legitimacy on its rules; I suggest that, beyond the strong desire to avoid failure, developing countries and nongovernmental organizations accepted the Paris Agreement to secure the participation of the United States and to uphold previous agreements. Given the reification of existing rules, the ratchet-up mechanism and nonstate actors offer the last remaining hopes in global efforts to catalyze climate action on a scale necessary to safeguard the climate.

Human Rights and Precautionary Principle: Limits to Geoengineering, SRM, and IPCC Scenarios

“…Therefore, the next look for regulation leads to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement. It has often been discussed that the PA is hardly ecologically effective, because it does not provide concrete enforcement mechanisms and global governance instruments such as a binding global emissions trading scheme [6,[130][131][132][133][134]. This, however, is not the relevant point in this case.…”

“…This, however, is not the relevant point in this case. Neither is the fact that the PA (and perhaps also the UNFCCC) contains a number of provisions that merit discussions whether they are legally binding at all, and how very specific reduction targets for individual states are not explicitly listed [130,[134][135][136][137]. In any case, however, the basic target commitment and the system of nationally chosen reduction targets based on this target commitment are binding.…”

“…It is undisputed that the agreement as such is constructed as a binding international treaty [136]; and in the case of Art. 2-4 PA specifically, the wording does not indicate that it is not meant to be binding [6,130,132,138]. While modal verbs such as "will" or "aim" can be interpreted as merely non-binding announcements, the words "are to" and "shall", as used in Art.…”

Applying a leverage points framework to the United Nations climate negotiations: The (dis)empowerment of youth participants

“…While hailed by many as an achievement, the Paris Agreement was also heavily criticized by some climate justice organizations as being insufficient to limit global average warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, a benchmark for small island and low-lying coastal nations. It has also been critiqued academically, where scholars have highlighted it may be insufficient to adequately mitigate emissions (Allan, 2019;Kemp, 2018). Youth, in particular, were among the most critical of the agreement, arguing that it did not contain stringent enough measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to protect young and future generations.…”

Three Models of Global Climate Governance: From Kyoto to Paris and Beyond

“…More pessimistic observers believe that, even with its legalized pledge-and-review process, the Paris Agreement does not represent the 'breakthrough' that many have portrayed it to be. Instead, they say, it is at best an incremental advance upon a model that has already been triedwith meagre results (Allan, 2018;Bang et al, 2016;Dauvergne, 2018). For the most part, these critics argue, Paris simply repackaged key elements of the Copenhagen Accord and legitimatized the growing emphasis on business and city-led transnational governance schemes.…”